Flashback
by SaintRidley
Summary: Rubeus Hagrid is falling, having leapt off the motorbike to buy Harry some time to reach a safe haven. As he falls, his life flashes before his eyes. Not my characters. They belong to J.K. Rowling.


_Flashback_

He had jumped off the motorbike and was plummeting toward the ground, throwing a mighty fist into the face of the Death Eater he had thrown himself at to save Harry. He couldn't make heads from tails, and nothing, nothing had ever terrified him in the way that he had just been. Those eyes… Those red eyes on that white face, they'd appeared from out of nowhere in the midnight sky. "I… I hope Harry made it okay," Rubeus Hagrid said, choking back a sob as he plunged toward what he assumed would be his demise.

_The little boy with the ruddy face, two years old and already four feet tall, rides his mother's shoulders. She has big, broad shoulders, and snarls playfully at her son as he grips her ears so that he will not fall. His father runs below, ready to catch him should that happen, only knee-high to his wife._

_ The boy now cries in his father's arms, his mother nowhere to be found. He could only be about a year older by now. His father comforts him, telling the child that he will always be there for him, that he will never leave. The boy stands up and wipes his tears before giving his father a hug and saying almost inaudibly, _"Thank you, papa"

_ Now about age seven, and a little more than five feet tall, he runs outdoors in search of new and interesting creatures to play with. He finds himself alone in a forest clearing, alone except for a young troll. The fight is quick, the boy victorious._

_ Eleven years old and seven feet tall, the young man sits at the breakfast table with his father as an owl swoops down. Reading the letter, the small man breaks into a wide smile, so proud that his son has just been accepted to Hogwarts. He runs off to find a camera, and returns, setting the timer and being set upon his son's shoulder as the flash goes off._

_ Only a year later, the young man sits at the Gryffindor table, tears streaming down his cheeks as he holds a letter notifying him of his father's untimely passing. Some students walk by, pausing to whisper words of sorrow and grief for him. Others, however, sit at their tables without a care in the world. Some boys at the Slytherin table eye him cautiously, chief among them a handsome fourth year who bores holes into the giant boy with his eyes._

_ Another year later, and the boy is coaxing a large spider into a box. Then, suddenly…. _

"Evening, Rubeus."

_ Slamming the door to the cabinet shut, the boy looks up, fearfully. As he stands he asks as calmly as possible, _"What yer doin' down here, Tom?"

"It's all over. I'm going to have to turn you in, Rubeus. They're talking about closing Hogwarts if the attacks don't stop."

_More words, some confusion. Suddenly, Tom casts a spell, knocking Rubeus back into the cabinet, rattling it so that the spider can get out and escape. Within the hour, an old wizard stands in front of the two boys, a pair of Ministry officials flanking him. The elderly wizard presents a plaque to Tom, before asking for the wand of the younger boy. Silently handing it over, the boy turns in shame as the wand is turned over to the officials who quickly examine it before snapping it in half. They return the pieces, there being no possible way of repairing the wand._

_ The boy is now a man, twelve feet tall, and he is no longer the apprentice gamekeeper. This is his first year leading the fleet of boats to the castle, and he tries not to look nervous. A small group of students show up, first of them all. Two young boys, one with uncontrollable but well-kept black hair and glasses, the other with sleek black hair down to his shoulders, were taunting another pair of students. The young girl with red hair and the boy with long, greasy black hair were doing their best to ignore the taunts together. Remembering his own first year, he gave the second pair an encouraging smile._

_ He now stood with Lily and James, next to Sirius, Peter, Remus, and Professor Dumbledore, all gazing proudly at the little baby boy they had only just christened Harry James Potter. _

_ And a year later, again on the motorbike, bringing the boy away from the rubble and charred remains of the Potter's former house. He'd be bringing the boy to live with Muggles. Lily and James were dead, Sirius was out looking for Peter, and Harry would be living with Muggles. It was too much to take in at one time._

_ Now he stood at the door of a little cabin, rain pouring down hard over his head. After bending a gun barrel into a tight knot, he sits down with Harry, the spitting image of his father, and hands over a Hogwarts admissions letter. The next morning, they go to Diagon Alley to procure supplies, and Harry is bought a snowy owl as a birthday gift. _

_ The black egg cracks open, the wyrmling unfurls his wings and coughs up smoke and sparks. _"Bless him, look, he knows his mummy!"

_ Two years ago, in the mountains of Eastern Europe, he and Olympe are trekking through the snow, arguing as he attempts to lead his brother along. She parts company with him, unable to go on like this any longer._

_ Only a month ago, though it felt like an eternity, he had witnessed the body of Albus Dumbledore lying motionless on the ground below the Astronomy Tower. Overwhelming grief turned into outstanding anger as the name Severus Snape was implicated in the death, as he momentarily recalled the first time he saw Snape, helping Lily Evans ignore taunts from James Potter and Sirius Black. _

_ Tonight, the owl had died, struck down by a Killing Curse. He and Harry had been on the motorbike, fleeing the Death Eaters, trying to reach the Tonks' home where they could safely reach the new headquarters. Snape had surely been leading some portion of the attack, he was sure of it. Different parts of his life were colliding around him, all as his own life was collapsing. _

He let go of the Death Eater, resigning himself to the inevitability of his death. Whether that death would come by the sudden stop at the end of this fall or at the wand of Tom Riddle, he did not know. He was fine with it, though. He had bought Harry some time, and soon, he would be with his father in the hereafter.

"Hagrid! Hagrid -- _Accio Hagrid!_"

"_Your wand, Selwyn, give me your wand!_"

All went black._  
_


End file.
